July 1, 2016

MHA to oppose visa-free entry

News: Ministry of Home Affairs (MHA) informed Prime Minister’s Office that they were against a proposal to allow ‘visa-free’ entry to business visitors and tourists from 18 key countries, including ChinaContext: The Prime Minister’s Office had recently considered dispensing with the visa requirement for business visitors and tourists from certain regions

Regions included the BRICS (Brazil, Russia, India, China and South Africa) and the proposed Regional Comprehensive Economic Partnership (RCEP) countries

MHA: Electronic tourist visa on arrival (eTV) and the normal tourist visas are granted within 2 or 3 days of an application in majority of the cases

MHA questioned the need for visa waiver when MHA is issuing visas promptly

Further, MHA warned that the security situation in India is not conducive for the proposed waiver

December 31, 2015

Centre pushing to revive NATGRID, looking for CEO

To rope in an intelligence official to head the federal counter-terror centre.

The Union government is set to make an aggressive effort to accomplish one of the most ambitious intelligence projects in recent memory.

National Intelligence Grid (NATGRID) is a centralised agency which stores sensitive personal information on citizens from almost 2 dozen agencies to be made available for counter-terror investigations.

Government will appoint a senior serving government official, in all likelihood one with an intelligence background, to head NATGRID.

Raghu Raman, NATGRID’s first and only CEO, who had bagged the job while working for automobile major Mahindra.